The Good, The Bad, and The Broken
by calazar
Summary: After the events of the underground a scarred Frisk, a resurrected Chara, and their friends live in a small mountain town called Gravity Falls. At the same time, two twins head to this same town to live with their great uncle for the summer. But it's summer, what could possibly go wrong? (Fem Frisk and Chara.)
1. Chapter 1: The War is Over

"Trust me, Kid. She's not worth saving."

"But she's in pain, I have to try."

"So what you're saying is that you want me to help you commit mass genocide, just so you can talk to the one person who's more insane than you?"

"Yes!"

"...fine, kid. You win."

"Promise?"

"...yeah. I promise."

"So, you're finally here? How many friends did you kill this time? Ten? Twenty?"

"Too many."

"Told ya Kid, you don't want to go down this path."

"I have to."

"Then, I have to stop you."

"But... you promised."

"Yeah… and this is why I don't make promises. Too many strings attached. Too many regrets."

"But... but..."

"Sorry old lady. Sorry Kid. I just can't do this anymore."

"Welp. Can't say I didn't try. … just, remember to reset for me, will ya. And… take your time in the ruins. I don't want to see you anytime soon."

"I'm sorry. I'm _so_ sorry."

"Sure you are, Kid"

 **The Good, The Bad, and The Broken**

 **Chapter One: The War is Over (and we are beginning)**

Once upon a time, there was an angel named Frisk. She was the kindest girl anyone had ever met. She fell into the hostile underground and helped everyone she saw. And, despite being constantly barraged by danger and peril, she never hurt anyone. She led the monsters that inhabited the underground to the surface, giving them hope and prosperity for the first time in over three hundred years. Then, she found out that there was one person yet to be saved.

The person was a demon, a remnant of the first fallen human of the underground. The spirit went by the name of Chara and was made up of misery and hate. So, when Frisk learned how to talk to the spirit, she grabbed the opportunity at once. Unfortunately, that meant reseting her progress in the underground through the power of Determination and going back to murder everyone she'd ever saved. She tried multiple times trying to kill as few monsters as possible but she never met Chara. Finally, the once selfless girl gave up and killed everyone in the underground, including the woman she called her mother.

When she finished her goal, she stood before Chara, the one person she had never once saved. But the demoness that was once full of loathing now looked at the shattered soul before her and felt only sadness. The roles had been reversed. Now Frisk was the one that needed saving, the one who was broken. Chara was saved, her soul given back to her by an old locket found in the king of the underground's castle, but Frisk was not the same girl who had fallen down in the beginning.

The two girls reset and once again saved the underground. And when the monsters once again looked out onto the sunrise, it seemed that everything was once again back to normal. The monsters scattered around Mount Ebbot, inhabiting various towns with the majority moving into a small mountain town called Gravity Falls.

Frisk Dreemurr was lying on the floor of a small apartment in Gravity Falls. It had been a month since the monsters had been freed by her and her adoptive sister Chara. Her light, chin length brown hair lay pooled around her as she lay, spread eagle, in her and Chara's room. She wore her favorite blue and purple striped t-shirt along with a pair of jeans. Her socks covered her ankles and disappeared into her jeans. Her old, black tennis shoes lay discarded by her side as she took a page from her friend Napstablook's book and thought about her existence, eyes shut peacefully. She was just about to slip off into a slumber when her sister burst through the door.

"Frisk!" Chara shouted as she ran into the room. "Get up, we've got company!"

Chara looked almost identical to Frisk. Her hair was the same shade and length as the other girl's. She wore a green and yellow striped short sleeved t-shirt and a pair of black jeans. She wore a golden heart-shaped locket around her neck that seemed to emit a faint red glow. She wore a pair of grey tennis shoes and white shocks that poked out just above her shoes. The only major difference Chara had from Frisk aside from her choice of clothing were their eyes. While Frisk's eyes were a warm chocolate color, Chara's eyes were nearly crimson, a trait that had scared off more than one would-be bully in her time on the surface.

"Frisk!" Chara groaned, annoyed at the other girl's lack of response. "Wake up!"

Frisk blinked a few times, her eyes flicking around the room for the source of the intrusion on her thoughts. When she spotted Chara, she smiled kindly and pushed herself up into a sitting position. She rubbed her eyes and gave her sister her undivided attention.

"Oh sorry Chara, I was thinking," she said kindly. "What did you say?"

"I said that we've got company, Frisk," Chara repeated. "A whole bus load a tourists who've probably never seen a monster in their life just arrived. We have about ten minutes before they get here and do something nasty. " Frisk nodded and quickly stood, grabbing her shoes and shoving them onto her feet.

"Let's go." She said as she ran out of her room. "Mom, we're going to go meet the tourists." With Chara on her heels, Frisk ran out of the house and towards the bus stop, Toriel's kind reply of acknowledgement following them out the door.

Dipper Pines sat in the back of the bus next to his energetic sister Mabel. She was bouncing around laughing and messing around as usual. He… had his nose stuffed into a book, paying no attention to her as he read about their destination. His messy brown hair was tucked under a military green baseball cap with a dark star on it to keep it out of his dull blue eyes. He wore an orange t-shirt under a fluffy, navy blue vest along with light grey shorts that sat just above his knees. He had black sneakers that were tied on tightly. In all, he looked like he was an average kid.

His sister however, was the more eccentric of the two. She had long brown hair that went down past her waist and curled up at the ends. It was tucked behind her star earring adorned ears with the help of a turquoise headband that never moved even though the twelve-year old was jumping all over the place.

Her bright, green eyes shone with excitement and her braced teeth never disappeared behind her lips as she was constantly smiling and laughing. She wore a sparkling purple sweater with the face of a purple cat on it, even though it was well over eighty degrees outside. She wore a turquoise skirt that was the same shade as her headband as well as black slipper-like shoes over ankle high white socks. They were heading towards Gravity Falls, where their great uncle Stan lived and worked.

"Gravity Falls, Oregon, one quarter mile." the bus driver announced.

Dipper closed his book and slid it into his backpack that was sitting next to him. Mabel grabbed her suitcase and stood up, her brother following her a second later. They made their way to the front of the bus, the only two people to get off at the backwater town. As they stepped off the bus they saw a man with grey hair in a black suit and dark red fez leaning against an old, red car looking bored. They recognised him as their uncle because of family pictures. Mabel smiled and ran towards the man.

"Grunkle Stan!" she shouted excitedly. The man looked up from the ground that had captured his attention in his boredom. He grimaced uncomfortably and started to nervously ring his hands.

"Hey ah, Mapel right?" he said. "Didn't you have a brother I was supposed to look after too?"

"It's Mabel, Grunkle Stan." Mabel clarified, still smiling "and my brother is called Dipper. He's right over there by the bus."

It was true, Dipper had not moved from his spot by the bus. This was because he was watching two girls argue a few feet away. They looked almost identical but that was not the weirdest thing about them. As they were arguing they were pushing a tall man dressed in a very realistic skeleton costume into a bush.

"That can't be real," he thought as he watched the bush shift through the skeleton's leg bones. "Yeah, definitely not real, but that guy must have spent over a year making that."

"I told you this would happen." the girl in a green shirt said in an annoyed tone.

"I'm sorry, Chara. But I can't see into the future. How was I supposed to know Sans would leave?" the girl in a blue shirt asked in a carefully level tone that barely hid her sadness as they successfully pushed the man into the bush.

"HUMAN? WHEN IS SANS COMING BACK?" the man shouted from behind the bush.

"I don't know, Pap." the girl in blue said, her whole body wilting as she followed the other girl into the bush.

"Hey Dipper!" Mabel shouted from across the lot, tearing his eyes from the scene. "Come on, Grunkle Stan's house isn't going to explore itself."

Dipper nodded and ran towards his sister, pushing the weird man from his mind. The two kids climbed into the back of the convertible watched the scenery as Stan drove them to his house.

Frisk walked behind Chara and Papyrus all the way to the skeleton's house. Yes Papyrus was a skeleton. He was what many would consider a lovable idiot. He wore the chest piece of a set of plate mail armor with a bright red star over his left breast along with a semi-shredded bright orange scarf that hung over his left shoulder. He wore the crotch piece of the plate mail and knee high, orange combat boots. He wore dark red gloves with golden cuffs that served no real purpose as he had no skin to keep warm but everyone just laughed it off and let him wear the things, if only to not hurt his feelings.

Everything else was left bare to the world, exposing his bones to the people of Gravity Falls. His small beady eyes were bright with excitement as he chatted about everything he had done since the last time he had seen the girls, namely improving his spaghetti recipe. When they reached the tall skeleton's house he smiled down at them and waved as he walked into the door, no literally, into the door.

"WOWIE!" he shouted with his smile never dimming. "SOMEBODY PUT THIS DOOR IN MY WAY. BUT NEVER FEAR, I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, SHALL NOT BE HINDERED."

He pointed his finger upward as he shouted this but once he was done he opened the door and waved goodbye as the two girls. Frisk waved back while Chara simply grimaced before they turned away from the house.

"Come on, Chara. Let's go, Mom's probably got lunch ready by now," Frisk said as she started to run towards their house.

"Hey wait up," Chara yelled as Frisk sped away.

After three days of working in the Mystery Shack, the tourist trap Grunkle Stan had converted his house into, Dipper was more than ready to get out and enjoy the summer. Mabel had taken the place in stride, having taken only a single night to set up her room and organise her things. She was now flirting with every single boy who stepped within twenty yards of the place, it was... a little freaky if Dipper had to be perfectly honest. He, on the other hand, had not had such an easy time adjusting. It was not his idea of a perfect summer.

This opinion was not improved when Grunkle Stan told him to do yet another menial task. This time it was to hang signs along the road and in the forest to draw in more customers for the shack. Dipper was less than thrilled with the job and reluctantly took the signs Stan had handed to him, along with a hammer and a bag of nails.

"Really Grunkle Stan? Everytime I go out there I feel like I'm being watched." Dipper protested. Stan sighed, rubbing his eyes under his large square glasses.

"Look kid, the monsters in the forest thing is just an urban legend. Something guys like me thought up to scare and attract people like him." Stan explained harshly, pointing to a round tourist in a pink striped t-shirt who was giggling at the sight of a Stan bobblehead.

Dipper groaned before walking out of the shack and down the road, nail up signs every couple of trees. After about a mile of this, Dipper was almost out of signs. As he grabbed the last one and readied the nail, he sighed in relief.

"Ah, finally. I can go back to the shack now." he said as he hammered the nail into the tree, only to hear the wood clang metallically and the nail to jerk back in his hand. "Gah! What the-?"

He tapped on the tree with his hammer to make sure it wasn't just his imagination. The tree clanged once more. Dipper put the hammer in his pocket and felt along the tree for any form of crack or imperfection. The tree was perfectly smooth, only painted in extreme detail to look like a living tree. It took a few seconds but Dipper did find a crack in the smooth metal. He pulled at the nearly invisible door with the tips of his fingers. Once he got under the plate he pulled it open to reveal an ancient radio transmitter.

Dipper flipped one of the many switches on the console, trying to turn the thing on. When nothing happened he jiggled one of the other switches a little only to hear a the sound usually only associated with sci-fi movies, the sound of a pressurized door being opened. Dipper turned around to see a small square had oped up in the ground a few feet away. He walked over to it and looked inside.

There was nothing but a white pac-man-ghost-like thing wearing headphones in the bottom. As soon as the ghost saw the boy it closed it's pale grey eyes and began to make a small buzzing sound.

"ZZZZZZZZZZZ." the ghost droned, as if pretending to be asleep. Dipper stared at the ghost in a mixture of confusion and fear. "Are they gone?"

"Um no, no I am not." Dipper replied, thoroughly confused at that point.

"Oh- I'm sorry, I come down here to be alone. I didn't mean to ruin your adventure," the ghost said sadly. "I think I should go now. See you later."

As soon as he said that he vanished into thin air. Dipper shuddered, wondering if he was going crazy, before turning his attention to the box instead. It would probably make more sense anyway. It was a metal box, a foot deep, with the only thing inside being an old, spider-web-covered book with a dark red cover. Dipper picked it up and blew off the thick layer of dust that had accumulated on it's cover. It had a gold, six fingered right hand on its cover with a number three drawn on the hand in black ink.

Dipper turned around and opened to the first page, placing the book on the ground as he did so. At first glance it seemed like a journal, with various entries on various dates going all the way back to thirty years prior. But as the twelve year old kept turning the pages he found it was more of an encyclopedia. An encyclopedia on the supernatural activities in Gravity Falls. Dipper flipped through the journal until he arrived at the last filled page. He read the final journal entry out loud to himself.

" _Unfortunately my suspicions have been confirmed. He was not here to help. He's watching me. I have managed to only delay the inevitable but I fear I may have doomed another group to extinction while doing so. I need to hide the journal. Keep it hidden where he can't find it. I have to remember,_ _TRUST NO ONE!_ "

"What?" Dipper asked as he snapped the book closed. "What does that mea-"

"HELLO!" Mabel yelled happily from behind him, cutting off his monologue and scaring him into fumbling with the closed book. "Whatcha doing? You left like an hour ago. Oo what's that? Some nerd thing?"

She pointed at the book clutched in Dipper's arms as he turned around to stare at his twin with wide eyes. She was wearing a bright pink sweater with a colorful shooting star on the front today, which was getting moss and dirt all over it as she was laying on a fallen tree behind him. Behind her stood Stan's pet goat, who had apparently followed her and was currently staring at the book hungrily. Dipper looked at the book before not so sneakily slipping it behind his back.

"It's uh, uh it's nothing." he stuttered

"It's uh, uh, uh nothing." Mabel laughed, imitating her brother and waving her hands around. "Come on, are you really not going to show me?"

"Uh no, but let's go somewhere private before I do ok?" Dipper said while jerking the book away from the goat, who had trotted over and tried to take a bite of the old tome. Mabel nodded and the two kids headed for the shack side by side.

In the Dreemurr apartment things were normal, well as normal as things could get in a house filled with the former queen of monsters, two human girls and a psychopathic flower that couldn't feel emotions. Toriel, the previously mentioned queen of monsters, was finishing up making dinner for them in the small kitchen while Frisk and Chara were in the living room. Chara was laying on her stomach, drawing Flowey the flower as he posed dejectedly for her a few feet away. Meanwhile Frisk was spread out on the couch reading, managing to take up nearly the entire thing and still sit upright.

"Children, dinner's ready." Toriel called out.

The two children got up and helped their adoptive mother set up for the soup that she had prepared. Chara set Flowey on the table as he watched the proceedings, glaring at Frisk and Toriel whenever they bumped him. When they all sat down, Frisk looked over everyone and smiled. Chara was laughing at Flowey as he tried to tip over her bowl with the large leaves he used for arms and Toriel was smiling as she ate her soup.

Toriel was a goat-like monster with an air of kindness and regality. She had bright, clean, white fur with long floppy ears that hung down an inch past her chin, as well as two small grey horns that spouted from the top of her head. Her eye's were a fiery red and she had small fangs protruding from her short muzzle. Other than that, she looked rather human-like with five fingers and basic human structure.

She wore a long, dark purple robe along with a black and gold scarf wrapped around her neck and shoulders. On the front of the robe was a white symbol that looked like a pudgy bird flying above three stars. Around her waist was a white belt with a bright orange jewel resting in the center of it. She wore a pair of ragged wrappings around her feet as the only form of protection from the stones and pebbles that littered the sidewalks of Gravity Falls.

After dinner Chara and Frisk went to a walk in the forest to the north of town, or, at least, they tried to before Toriel got them wrapped up in a conversation about Papyrus and methods of introducing monster to more humans.

"I'm simply saying that humans as a whole are idiots who love nothing more than to kill what they don't understand." Chara griped half an hour later with her arms crossed.

"People have changed Chara." Frisk said "They're not all bad. Look at how much good Asgore has done."

"But those are politicians, Frisk," Chara argued. "You can't trust them farther than you can throw them."

"Why not just kill the idiots and keep the rest?" Flowey asked, smiling evilly.

"No!" Frisk said quickly, glaring at the sentient flower. "Flowey, we talked about this. You can't just kill people you don't like."

The flower grumbled about Frisk being a spoilsport while Chara chuckled and fingered her locket. The argument continued on for nearly an hour before the girls remembered that they had wanted to go take a walk. They shouted their intentions to Toriel and ran out into forest. They saw several monsters from the underground along the path, including a white frog-like monster called a froggit. Frisk laughed a bit when the froggit started to hop around a bit at the sight of them. Frisk started up a fake combat with the creature, smiling as it sent flies at her and hopped around.

"That's very good," she laughed as one the flies hit her, ending the sparring match. "You're getting better."

"Ribbit ribbit." the frog replied, blushing slightly at the complement.

Frisk smiled kindly while Chara merely grinned slightly at her sister's antics. The two kept walking until they were deep in the forest. The sun's rays barely made their way through the thick foliage. Chara stopped for a second and looked around as if considering her surroundings.

"It kinda reminds you of Snowdin's forest doesn't it?" Chara asked.

"Yeah it kinda does." Frisk said evenly as she fingered a flowering bush, her smile from before having faded over time.

"Yeah now all we need is tons of snow and Sans popping out telling us crappy puns." Chara laughed.

"Yeah." Frisk said quietly, her face falling like a rock.

Chara clamped her mouth shut and wisely chose that opportunity to shut up before she made the situation worse. She stuffed her hands into her pockets and walked back the way they had come, her eyes firmly stuck to the ground in front of her feet. Frisk, however, stared at the bush, lost in thought. She stayed like that for a few minutes before looking up. Chara was nowhere in sight.

"Chara?" the Savior of Monsters called out. "Chara, can you hear me?"

She heard the snapping of twigs behind her and whirled around. An orange, radish-shaped Vegetoid froze in it's progress of burying itself into the ground. Frisk relaxed and waved at the monster. It smiled at her before burying itself up to it's leaves. The girl looked around slowly, trying to find anything that could help her get back to town, as her sense of direction was nothing to brag about. She didn't see anything at first but as she looked deeper into the trees she saw some movement several yards away.

It looked like someone retreating into the foliage. The girl ran after them dodging trees and rocks as she hurried to catch up with the one person who could help her. As she got closer to the figure, she heard voices. It sounded like a girl and the deep voice of a Loox with a head cold.

"Finally, alone at last." the girl said loudly, sounding as if she had been waiting forever to say that sentence.

The Loox said something that Frisk couldn't hear and she rushed forwards, trying to cross the ten yards that was still between the two parties. Just as she was about to rush into the clearing the Loox and the girl were in, a sack was thrown over her head and she was tripped by something at ankle level. In under two seconds she was tied up and being carried around by dozens of people with small hands and deep voices.

"It's okay, Mabel. We understand," a new, smoother voice said kindly. "Just know that we'll never forget you...because we're going to kidnap you." The girl screamed but was swiftly silenced.

"Hey boss, we found this girl running towards you and Lady Mabel," a gruff voice said as Frisk struggled in her bonds "What should we do with her?"

"Take her with us, the queen will need servants." the smooth voice said

"Yessir." the gruff voice agreed.

In the time after he had explained the journal to Mabel, she had gotten herself a creepy boyfriend that called himself "Norman," and then gone on a "date" with him. That part Dipper was fine with, what he wasn't fine with was the fact that "Norman" acted like no other human the boy had encountered before. He seemed to have no coordination at all, no feeling of pain, and only spoke in short broken sentences. Dipper had consulted the book and come to the conclusion that Norman was a zombie.

"Mabel, I'm telling you Norman is not what he seems," Dipper argued with Mabel after she got back to the mystery shack.

"Oh Dipper, you're just being paranoid," Mabel said lightly, waving away his concerns.

"No, I'm not," Dipper said drawing out the journal from a pocket on the inside of his vest and opening it up to the page concerning Zombies. "Everything adds up. His lack of reaction, to pain, his limp, and have you noticed? He never blinks, ever! Remember what the book said? Trust no one."

"Well what about me, huh?" Mabel asked, getting annoyed at her brother. "Why can't you trust me?"

"Mabel, I am telling you. He's going to eat your brains!" Dipper shouted, grabbing her by the shoulders and shaking her slightly.

"Listen dipper," Mabel said angrily, getting fed up with his paranoia. "I am going on another date with Norman at five o'clock. _I_ am going to be adorable."

She pushed him away from her, making him stagger back a few steps. Her usual smile was gone replaced with pure irritation. Dipper looked at her wide eyed, obviously not expecting this response.

" _He_ is going to be dreamy." Mabel continued now shouting loudly, pushing him closer towards the door of their room. "And _you_ are not going to ruin this with one of your stupid conspiracies!"

With that she shoved out the door and slammed it in his face. Dipper sighed and sat on the floor, pulling out the journal and staring at the zombie page. He heard footsteps approaching down the hall and looked up as Stan sauntered down the hall.

"Jeez kid, ya look like you're a kicked puppy or something." he said looking between the door and Dipper in confusion. "What's eatin' ya?"

"Well I'm convinced that Norman isn't who he appears to be," Dipper sighed "I think he's dangerous, and to top it all off Mabel won't listen to me."

"Well what proof do you have?" Stan asked, crossing his arms

"Just a hunch." Dipper said, closing the journal so Stan couldn't see what it was.

"Well then there's your problem." Stan said, smirking "ya got no proof, no evidence. I'll loan my old camera. That'll probably work for ya." Dipper stood up and nodded determinedly.

"Thanks Grunkle Stan." he said as the old man led him down the stairs.

Chara ran through the forest, eyes flitting back and forth through the trees. She had been so lost in her own thoughts that she hadn't noticed that Frisk hadn't been following her after her blunder. She vaulted a log and finally ended up back in the grove. The Froggit was gone...and so was her sister. Chara looked all over, even called out her name a few times, but she did not hear or see any signs of the other girl.

"Damn it!" she shouted before rushing towards the town "If she's hurt I'm-." she cut herself off and ran faster to gather the other monsters to search for Frisk.


	2. Chapter 2: Hell Hath no Fury

**The Good, The Bad, and The Broken**

 **Chapter Two: Hell Hath no Fury**

"Mabel!" Dipper yelled as he crashed the golf cart through the forest, barely maintaining control. "Mabel where are you?"

"Dipper! Help me!" Mabel's voice echoed faintly from his left.

Dipper instantly jerked the wheel towards the noise and sped over a hill, the cart flying a foot into the air before landing and zigzagging. Dipper corrected course and floored it.

"Don't worry, I'll save you from that zombie." he yelled.

After Stan had given him an old video recorder, he had set out to collect the evidence need to convince Mabel of the danger Norman posed. He had taken the time to familiarize himself with the camera, finishing just in time to follow Mabel and Norman on their date. He spent an hour following them, capturing every moment of it on. After that he was beginning to doubt his claims. Dipper hadn't seen anything that would actually warrant any form of negative reaction towards him. Just a weird boy with no feeling of pain. He had given up after another half hour, heading back to the Shack feeling thoroughly humbled.

It was boredom more than anything else that had caused him to check the camera to see if he had missed anything. He had reviewed the footage halfheartedly, fast forwarding every few seconds. At first it had seems that all was well, but then the camera had caught Norman's hand falling off _and then him reattaching it!_ Dipper had dashed outside and gotten the keys to the golf cart from Wendy, Stan's red headed cashier. Now that he thought about it she was kinda cute-

Dipper's line of thought was cut short as he nearly flew off the side of a cliff. He swerved and heard Mabel calling his name in fear. She also seemed to be reassuring herself that _they_ were going to be okay. He drove the cart towards her voice once more and barreled deeper into the woods. He drove down into an underground clearing and slowed down as he saw a hoard of things that wore red-hats swarming around a girl in a blue t-shirt who's arms were tied to the ground, struggling and writhing, and Mabel, who was swatting at the things as they tried to force her down beside the other girl.

They looked like three foot tall, middle to old aged men wearing overalls and lumberjack boots, and, of course, every one of them wore a tall, pointy, red hat. One of the men stood outside of the group, seeming to be the leader. He had a brown beard that covered his chin and was shouting directions to Mabel and the other men.

"Come on you two, the more you struggle the more awkward this will be for everybody," he said encouragingly. "Ah Steve, you might not want to-"

He was cut off as the blue-clad girl kicked one of the men that was about to jump onto Mabel into a tree. The tiny man bounced off the trunk and clutched his stomach painfully before barfing up a rainbow.

"What the heck is going on here?" Dipper shouted brandishing the shovel that Soos, the Mystery Shack's handyman, had given him.

Some of the men froze but most of them just kept trying to force Mabel down. The captured Pines twin turned at the sound of her brother's voice and waved her arms frantically.

"Dipper! Norman turned out to be a bunch of gnomes and kidnapped me and this other girl." she shouted before grabbing a gnome that had crawled up her back and drop-kicking him away.

"Huh, gnomes? Oh I was way off then." Dipper said as he pulled the journal out of a pocket on the inside of his vest. He opened it up to the correct page and quickly scanned its contents. "Gnomes: inhabitants of the Gravity Falls forest. Weaknesses: unknown."

He looked up from the journal to see Mabel now bound next to the other girl. Neither of them looked very happy. The other girl glared at the gnomes and muttered something behind the cloth gag covering her mouth.

"Oh come on!" Mabel complained as the gnomes secured the last rope.

"Hey! Hey!" Dipper shouted charging up to the one who appeared to be the leader. "You let them go."

"Oh hi!" the gnome said as he jumped around. "You see, thing is, this is all just a big misunderstanding."

The gnome spread his arms placatingly while Dipper crossed his arms angrily.

"You see, they were never in any real danger." the gnome continued. "Your sister, she's just marrying all one thousand of us and becoming our gnome queen for all eternity. And the other one? Oh, well, every queen needs servants, right?"

He turned to the two captured girls and smiled pleadingly. The blue girl mumbled something behind the cloth and Madel opened her mouth angrily.

"You guys are butt-faces!" she shouted at the top of her lungs. The other gnomes quickly clamped her mouth shut and gave her the same treatment as the other girl.

"Give them back. Right. Now." Dipper demanded holding the shovel like a spear at the gnomes face. The tiny man scoffed and laughed.

"Do you think you can hurt me with that?" he laughed. "Do you have any idea who you're dealing with?"

" **Do you?** " a demonic sounding voice snarled from the forest.

The gnomes all jumped in fright and whirled around as a new girl in a green t-shirt stalked through the foliage towards them. She wore black jeans that were flecked with some sort of dark red paint. In her hands was a blood red carving knife that had a string of the same color connecting to a golden, heart-shaped hanging from her neck. Her eyes were black where they should have been white and she had dark crimson irises. They seemed to be bleeding slowly as there were inch-long red streaks sliding down her cheeks. She flicked the knife in front of her face and smiled broadly, drops of red flew off the blade once she stopped its movement.

" **Give me back my sister, you wastes of space,** " she commanded in the same creepy, echo-y voice. " **Or else you'll end up like your friends back there.** "

"Come on now," the lead gnome said nervously "let's talk this out. Why don't we make a deal?"

" **Oh yes, I like that idea,** " the girl giggled evilly. " **You give me back your hostages and I don't kill you. How does that sound?** "

The lead gnome gulped before nodding slowly. Dipper stared at the girl in horror. She had to be insane or, at the very least, dangerous. He wanted to run away but he was frozen in fear. The gnomes seemed to be suffering from the same problem. The girl took another step forward and everyone who could took a step back. Before the girl could do anything else she flickered, as if her image were projected on a old fashioned TV with a bad connection.

Dipper jumped as a hand touched his shoulder. He turned to see another girl who looked exactly like the psychotic girl, even down to the same clothes, but without the demonic features. Dipper yelled and swung the shovel at her. The girl's eyes widened just before the shovel smacked into her side.

The girl stumbled back and landed onto her back. As soon as she landed, the psychotic girl flickered and vanished, like she had never been there in the first place. Dipper reached into his vest with thoughts of checking the journal if disappearing people was something he should be worried about. This was cut short, however, when the blue girl struggled and yelled towards the green girl, fear and worry evident in her voice.

As soon as the psychotic girl vanished, the gnomes all turned to stare at the green girl and Dipper. The green girl got to her feet lethargically as she glared viciously at Dipper, her eyes flashing with barely contained malice. Her expression didn't change at all when she looked towards the gnomes.

"Intruder!" the lead gnome yelled

The green girl grabbed Dipper's shovel and ran towards Mabel and the other girl, cutting the ropes with a downward slash of the blade. The blue girl got to her feet and pulled the cloth away from her mouth, spitting violently. The three girls ran past Dipper, who was gaping at the green clad girl in fear. Mabel grabbed his arm and hauled him into the golf cart.

"They're stealing our queen!" the leader shouted. "Everyone after them! gnomes of the Forest, get them!"

The four preteens clambered into the cart with the blue girl and Dipper sitting in the back with a perfect view of the gnomes as the climbed onto one another and formed something akin to a giant made of gnomes.

"Drive." the blue girl squeaked "Chara, drive!"

The green girl nodded and floored it, yelling something about holding on as she did, as if Dipper needed reminding. The monstrosity towered above them and took a step forward, narrowly missing the cart.

Frisk watched in horror as the gnome army turned into a giant mass of bodies hell bent on destroying the cart and capturing them again. The massive creation was being controlled by Jeff, the leader of the gnomes that had taken her and the other girl, who was now sitting atop the heads of three other gnomes and controlling them from there. The giant took another step forward, shaking the ground and knocking the cart a few feet into the air.

When the cart landed and was back under control, Chara turned around in her seat to look at the giant mass of gnomes stomping towards them. It only took a few seconds for Mabel to yell and pull on her shirt, causing the former demon to turn her eyes back to the ground in front of her. She swerved to avoid a rock and pressed the pedal harder, as if that would make the cart go faster. The giant raised its hand over it's head and slammed it down a few feet from the cart, the gnomes dissembling then scrambling back together.

"Chara-" Frisk started

"Faster, go faster." Mabel said as she stared at the gnomes in fear.

"Give us back our queen!" Jeff yelled

"Well I can see that you're just the object of attention here, Frisk." Chara said not taking her eyes off the trail. Frisk didn't respond. This was because she was gaping mutely at the gnomes that had ripped a tree out of the ground and raised it above their head.

"Tree!" Mabel yelled, leaning out of the side of the passenger seat as the gnomes threw the twenty foot tree at the cart.

"Gogogogo." Dipper yelled quickly at the same time.

"Chara?" Frisk asked when Chara didn't respond in any meaningful way.

The tree flew in front of the small vehicle. It slammed into the ground just after Chara squeezed the cart under it, ripping the flimsy roof off and sending the cart careening onto it's side. The four kids grabbed onto whatever they could and held on for dear life.

The cart slid several feet before stopping a not far from a multi-storied house. Chara crawled over the side of the cart and flopped onto the ground, the others following her slowly. Frisk had a few gashes on her arms and legs while Dipper had lost his army green baseball cap and was scratched up a little. Mabel's sweater was a little ripped but other than the miscellaneous scrapes and bruises they were fine.

The giant made of gnomes flicked off ten or so tiny men and they surrounded the four quickly. They were all snarling and baring their teeth like animals. The giant stepped back and Jeff smiled at them menacingly.

"Stay back." Dipper ordered, placing himself in front of girls and holding the shovel like a weapon.

Jeff made the gnome giant lean down and flick away the shovel. It went flying into the trees with a resounding clang. The giant stood up straight and Jeff cupped his hands around his mouth.

"It's the end of the line." he shouted through his hands. "Mabel, marry us before things turn ugly. Trust me, if you resist, you're really not going to like what happens next."

Frisk's eyes widened in horror as an old phrase popped into her head. She dropped to the ground, clutching her head. Dipper could hear her muttering a string of apologies and sobbing quietly. Kara, he thought that was her name at least, glared at Jeff and took a step forward, only to be stopped by Mabel's arm on her shoulder.

"Wait, I gotta do it." she said, stepping forward as Dipper dug in his vest for the journal, hoping it would have an answer to the situation.

"Mabel," the boy complained, taking a step towards the two girls "don't do this. Are you crazy?"

"Dipper, just trust me." his sister said, not looking away from Jeff.

"What?!" he asked, shocked

"Dipper, just this once, trust me, okay?" she begged. Dipper sighed but backed away from the two girls. Mabel walked towards the giant slowly.

"Ok Jeff, I'll marry you." she said reluctantly.

"Hot dog!" Jeff cheered loudly, swinging his arm in a sort of victory pump. "Let me just crawl down there and we'll make it official."

He hopped off his perch and crawled down the clump of gnomes, muttering apologies every now and then as he accidentally stepped on the face of a gnome here or there. He walked over to Mabel and offered her a ring with a large, clear crystal on it. He smiled hopefully, silently asking her approval of the gift. She lowered her hand and he slid it onto her finger.

"Badda bing, badda bang!" he cheered, doing a fist pump. "Now let's get you and your servant back to the forest, honey!"

"You may now kiss the bride." Mabel interrupted as Chara took a threatening step forward with a blood red knife in hand.

"Well, don't mind if I do." Jeff said happily, not noticing the other girl at his back.

He leaned forward and closed his eyes, puckering up for the twelve-year old. Mabel smiled and leaned away from him, reaching for a leaf blower she had hidden in a pile of leaves earlier in the day; don't ask why, she'll never tell. She flicked the leaf blower into reverse and pushed it towards Jeff's face, her smile gone. She glared at the gnome as he got sucked into the hand held machine and got lodged in the barrel.

"Hey, hey wait." Jeff squawked in fear. "Let's talk about this."

"That's for lying to me." the Pines girl snarled. She cranked up the power on the machine, sucking the man further into the tight space. "That's for breaking my heart! And this is for messing with my brother and friends!"

With that she handed the machine to Dipper, who had grimaced at the word "friends" and walked up beside her. She watched as he flipped the machine to full forwards force. Jeff shot out of the blower like a bullet, crashing into the giant and scattering the gnomes like bowling pins.

Jeff screamed in terror as he flew into the woods. Almost immediately, the gnomes all began staggering around and muttering about needing orders. Chara stepped forwards to where her back was to the twins and raised her knife menacingly.

" **You want orders?** " she said, her voicing becoming demonic again. " **Fine! Stay away from my sister or it'll be the last thing you do.** "

The gnomes all gawked at her before running away as fast as they could. She turned back to the twins and threw her knife into the air. The Pines' eyes followed it as it flew into the air then disappeared, flickering out of existence.

"How the heck did you do that?" Dipper asked her.

Chara didn't respond as she picked up her sister. She then began to walk towards town with Frisk's arm draped over her shoulder, the other girl staggering a little. Before she had taken two steps, her phone began buzzing in her pocket. She pulled it out and began reassuring the person on the other end that Frisk was fine. She flicked her phone shut after a few seconds of reassurance.

"Hey, wait!" Mabel called. Chara turned her head slightly but kept walking stiffly. "You never told us your names. I'm Mabel."

"I'm Frisk." Frisk sniffled weakly over her shoulder as Chara didn't react. "And this is my sister, Chara."

"Cool." Mabel said, waving happily. "Want to come in?"

Dipper frowned and took a step forwards when Frisk smiled kindly but didn't respond. Chara never took her eyes off Fisk as she stopped and let the other girl handle the conversation.

"Do you... need us to help you get home?" Dipper asked reluctantly.

"No we're fine," Frisk reassured. "But thank you."

"Thanks for your help," Dipper said, rubbing his arm a little. "No telling what would've happened if you hadn't been there."

The two girls nodded, turned back to the road, and began to trudge back to town. The twins watch them slowly walk towards town before turning towards the Mystery Shack and heading inside. Just as they were about to walk through the door, Mabel stopped and smiled awkwardly.

"Hey Dipper," she started "that got me thinking. I, um… I'm sorry for ignoring your advice this afternoon. You really were just looking out for me."

"Oh, don't be like that. You saved our butts back there." Dipper said approvingly.

"Yeah well, I guess I'm just sad that my first boyfriend turned out to be a bunch of gnomes." Mabel stated glumly.

"Look on the bright side," Dipper encouraged "maybe the next one will be a vampire, that would be cool."

"Oh, you're just saying that." Mabel laughed

"Awkward sibling hug?" Dipper offered, well, awkwardly

"Awkward sibling hug," Mabel agreed.

The two hugged for a few seconds then patted each other on the back twice.

"Pat pat," they said at the same time before laughing and walking into the gift shop of the mystery shack. Inside they saw Grunkle Stan counting stacks of money from the days tours. He looked over at them and his eyes widened.

"Yeesh," he said in surprise. "What happened to you two? Ya get hit by a bus?"

The two twins looked down at their appearance and shrugged before heading towards their room for some much needed rest. Stan watched them before raising his hand.

"Wait," he called. "I, uh, accidentally overstocked on my products and need to get rid of some. So, uh, why don't you two take something from the gift shop. On the house, ya know?" Mabel looked at him with stars in her eyes while Dipper looked skeptical.

"What's the catch?" he asked, his eyes narrowing.

"The catch is do it before I change my mind," Stan said quickly, as if he were already regretting his decision. "Now take something."

The twins looked around while stan counted his money and stuffed the bills into his cash register. Dipper gravitated towards the more practical items, such as the clothes, as it was rather hard to make those cheaply. He eventually settled on a new baseball cap to replace the one he had lost in the wreck. Instead of army green like his old one, this one was white and blue with a blue pine tree decorating the front. Dipper looked in the nearby mirror and nodded his approval before turning towards Mabel, who was still looking.

She had taken to searching through all the boxes that were scattered along the wall, digging through and throwing aside things that didn't seem all that safe in Dipper's opinion. She was digging through the last box when her face lit up and she whipped out an item from the box. She held it above her head in victory and Dipper finally got a good look at it. It was a gun with a three pronged hook protruding from the nozzle with a bundle of rope tied to the end.

"I'll take this grappling hook," she stated happily.

"Uh, wouldn't you something else?" Stan asked, wondering how his old grappling hook got in there. "Like a doll or something?"

"Nope!" Mabel said as she shot the hook towards the ceiling.

The hook rocketed upwards and wrapped itself around a rafter before the pulley mechanism in the gun hauled Mabel after it.

"Grappling hook," she giggled as she hung from the ceiling

"Fair enough," Grunkle Stan said, ignoring Dipper as the boy covered his eyes with his hand.

After Stan and Dipper got Mabel down from the ceiling, the two twins went upstairs and got ready for bed, much earlier than they normally did. Dipper sat in his bed, adding a few notes to the journal and writing his own entry as Mabel jumped up and down on her bed excitedly. She looked down the sight of her new grappling hook and fired at one of her stuffed animals on the other side of the room. The hook impaled the neck of the toy and carried it back to the girl, who was grinning like a loon. Dipper smiled at ther and gestured to the old oil lamp on the night stand.

"Hey, Mabel think you can get the light?" he asked before ducking as Mabel aimed her gun at both the lamp and him.

He heard a whoosh then the sound of glass shattering. He looked up to see the lamp gone from the room and the window shattered, Mabel's grappling hook hanging out of it.

"Hey, it worked!" she cheered.

"Well that's one mystery solved." Dipper said.

"Don't worry, Broseph," Mabel said as she settled under her covers "I'm sure there will be plenty more for you to solve this summer."

"We'll see, Mabel" Dipper replied as he too settled down for the evening.

Chara walked slowly up to the house just as the sun was going down. Frisk walked slowly behind her, her arms wrapped around herself. Chara waited at the door of their apartment for Frisk to join her. She opened the door and let her adoptive sister in. She was hoping to get this day over with as soon as possible, preferably not dealing with anything or anyone before that happened. What she got was nothing close to that. Some of the monsters who had helped look for Frisk were waiting in the living room, smiling happily.

There was the reptilian Alphys, former royal scientist of monsters, who had yet to actually be recognised by the human world for her work. She had bright, yellow scales and three small, conal, horns that grew from the back of her head. She wore a long white lab coat that covered her entire body and round glasses that she adjusted every few minutes. Her posture was hunched over with her hands never more than three feet from each other. Hers was the only face that wasn't grinning broadly, instead a nervous expression covered her features.

Beside her stood her girlfriend, the fish-like Undyne, formerly a royal guardsmen for King Asgore. She had dark blue scales and menacing yellow eyes with one of them being covered by a black eye-patch. He long red hair was tied back into a ponytail that reached her shoulder. She wore a black tank top, blue jeans, and red combat boots. Her grin was slightly unsettling as it revealed a row of large, pointed teeth.

Toriel stood behind them, looking concerned at the girls' states. Everyone quickly rushed forwards and expressed various degrees of concern. Toriel went about dealing with the scrapes and bruises while Undyne fished for details.

"So, who's butt did you kick?" she asked excitedly in her gravelly voice.

"H-hopefully nobody i-important," Alphys stuttered.

"We didn't kick anyone's butt," Chara grumbled, crossing her arms and glaring at the floor. "They kicked ours. My illusions didn't even help."

"My child, you cannot keep scaring people with those horrible projections," Toriel scolded.

"But Mom!" Chara complained angrily. Frisk tuned out the brewing argument when she saw Flowey sitting nearby, a small smile on his face. She walked over to him and knelt down to his level.

"What's got you so happy?" she asked. Flowey's face morphed into a sneer.

"It's not everyday I get to see her argue with someone other than the trash bag," he explained, his face fell into that of concern. "Plus, I'm… glad she's okay. You guys were gone for a long time." Frisk smiled and pat the flower on it's bulb.

"You know? You're a good friend when you want to be, Flowey," she said.

"Go away Frisk," Flowey hissed. "And if you dare say that again, I'll kill you."

Frisk quietly laughed the flower's halfhearted threat away. Flowey wouldn't kill her, Chara would kill him if he did. And even without a soul, he still cared deeply for Chara. Frisk got up and went to bed. She fell asleep almost instantly, the day's worries losing themselves in the flow of time. A few minutes later, Chara entered the room. She glanced at Frisk and sighed. She crawled into her bed on the other side of the room and fell asleep after several minutes of considering the strange creatures that had taken her sister.

They weren't native to the underground, she knew that for certain. So they had to have been on the surface for the past three hundred years. Chara scowled. Whatever happened, she got the feeling that more was going on here than just the rehabilitation of Monsters and Humans.

Twilight poured in through the windows of the corridor. The golden light lit up the hall as she stared at the short skeleton that stood in her way. She held the Dust covered knife loosely in her hand. Tears streamed down her face as she once again confronted her best friend. He stood there with his hands in his pockets as he watched her sadly

"So, you're finally here? How many friends did you kill this time? Ten? Twenty?" the skeleton asked in his deep voice, shutting his eyes and shaking his head.

"Too many," she sniffled.

"Told ya kid, you don't want to go down this path," the skeleton sighed. "Come on Kid, reset. Let's just forget about this."

"I can't," she cried, tears coming one after the other. "I have to do this."

"Then I have to stop you," the skeleton said sadly, taking his hands out of his pockets. The room started to take on a reddish hue as the light shifted into a crimson.

"But.. you promised," She whimpered

"Yeah… and this is why I don't make promises. Too many strings attached. Too many regrets," the skeleton said, his white pupils vanishing. "Sorry old lady. Sorry Kid. I just can't do this anymore."

The room erupted into flames and Frisk screamed in terror and surprise as they burnt up the hall. In place of the beautiful hall was a burning plain, flames and dust flying everywhere with the searing wind. The skeleton was engulfed in a matter of seconds, giving no outward reaction as he was turned to dust. Frisk ran towards him, screaming his name, but she seemed to be moving in slow motion. Suddenly the flames opened up to reveal the skeleton's skull. It's eyes were glowing a bright blue and a thick red red liquid ran past his teeth.

"Welp. Can't say I didn't try," the skull said tiredly. "But I guess I didn't really stand a chance, did I? After all who could beat the murderer who killed all her friends?"

The flames flickered then formed into people. A tall skeleton holding his head as he disintegrated, particles blowing off him from the wind. A broken robot with it's limbs strewn across the burnt ground, sparking violently. A blue fish-person in pitch black armor with a large gash across the front dissolving into a puddle. And finally, a goat-like creature in purple robes with a bleeding slash across her chest and cheek.

"You killed us, Frisk" they said in unison as they started to dissolve further. "Don't you remember?"

The fires burned bright and rushed towards her. Frisk covered her face with her arms in a futile attempt to protect herself. Just as the flames were about to reach her, she woke up with tears streaming down her face. She sat up and tried to calm herself down, until she saw the small fire flickering to life on her covers. She quickly grabbed her jeans and beat at the flames until they were out. She threw the slightly burnt jeans and covers on the floor and sat on the edge of her bed, her breathing ragged.

Chara opened her eyes and sat up as well. She watched curiously as some sparks danced around Frisk's fingers. She noted the tears and the ragged breathing and knew instantly that her savior had suffered another nightmare. Sighing, she got up and walked across the room to sit next to her sister. Chara hugged the other girl and held tight as Frisk sniffled and cried, the sparks disappearing as she got close.

"Hey, it's alright," Chara said softly. "We're safe. No one's hurt. You saved us, remember?"

Frisk nodded shakily, her tears starting to dry. Chara released her and led the other girl to her own bed. The demon of the underground sat at the foot of the bed as Frisk fell asleep, alternating between watching the stars through the bedside window and watching over Frisk as the twelve-year-old now slept dreamlessly.


	3. Chapter 3: As the Pieces Fall

**A/N: Hey guys, sorry it's been a while. I don't really have an excuse other than that I wanted to release the next two chapters like I did when I first published this story. With that said, sorry again, and ENJOY THE SHOW!**

 **Chapter Three**

As the Pieces Fall

"...just a scratch."

"Undyne..."

"Back off, Human. Let me die in peace. That's what you wanted right? To watch us all fade?"

"No, I never-"

"Spare me your false pity. You've killed too many of my friends to not want this. Papyrus, Snowdrake, that drakon hatchling. You hurt all of them."

"You don't understand. I have to do this."

" _Oh we understand, Frisk. After all it's not everyone who can kill their friends over, and over, and over!"_

"No, you- This- Please stop. This isn't what I wanted."

"Then what did you want, kid?"

"YES HUMAN, DO TELL US."

"A-after all, we d-did die for it."

" _ **Come on Human, tell us what we died for."**_

Frisk shot upright in her bed, her face covered in sweat and her cheeks streaked with tears. The Savior of the Underground curled in on herself and began shaking from the horrid dream.

"I'm not a murderer. I'm not a murderer." she muttered over and over.

"Wake up, guys!" Undyne yelled as she kicked down the door to Frisk and Chara's room. "We're going to the beach today!"

It had been a week since they had met Dipper and Mabel. They hadn't seen the twins since then, having been concerned with keeping the monsters out of trouble. Today, it seemed, was going to be no different.

Chara groaned and rolled over in her bed, shoving her pillow over her head in hopes of drowning out the loud Monster. Frisk curled herself into a ball under her covers in her sleep, unconsciously trying to ignore the loud Mer.

"Ngaaah, get up, you two!" Undyne shouted as she marched into the room, standing in between the two beds.

"Azzy, get rid of the scaly fiend please" Chara groaned, her voice muffled by the pillow.

"Why me?" Flowey complained from his pot on the desk that sat beside Chara's bed. "Get out of your damn bed and do it yourself."

Undyne had had enough and took matters into her own hands. She stomped over to Chara's bed and, using only one arm, scooped the girl out of bed, tucking the former demon under her arm, blankets and all. She then stepped over to Frisk's bed and repeated the process.

As soon as she was picked up, Chara began struggling and shouting obscenities at Undyne. Frisk, on the other hand, had succeeded in her attempt to ignore her and hung limply in the Mer's hold. The former royal guardswoman carried the two blanket-covered girls into the kitchen of the apartment with ease, laughing at Chara's shouts the whole time.

"Come on, Punk. It's saturday. The sun is shining, the flowers are blooming. It's a perfect day for the beach!"

Chara growled and kicked at the fish-woman once more before giving up completely. Undyne shook the two girls roughly to wake them both up. Frisk groaned as she woke up, rubbed her eyes, and lifted her blankets out of her view. She was greeted with the sight of a struggling Chara and a smiling Toriel, not to mention the sounds that accompanied both of those sights.

"Good morning, my children," the former queen said. "Get ready, it's a perfect day for the beach."

Frisk nodded tiredly and asked Undyne to set her down. The former Royal Guard Captain laughed boisterously and practically dropped the two girls to the floor. Chara shot up and glared at Undyne with barely controlled rage.

"Listen here," Chara spat, "you do that again and I'll-"

"My child," Toriel interrupted her with a sad look on her face, "it was upon my request that Miss Undyne get you both out of bed. I had forgotten your reluctance about being carried."

Chara scowled but looked down at the ground and began scuffing her sock-covered foot across the floor.

"Don't worry about it, Punk!" Undyne laughed, a giant grin on her face. "You can make it up to me by helping us get ready."

After that, it took fifteen minutes to get everyone in the house ready. It took Chara a few minutes to get prepared enough to help Undyne and Toriel, then another five to gather up various supplies for their day that the beach. In all, once they all actually got to the town lake it was the middle of the morning.

"S-see? It's purfect out t-today." Alphys stuttered as they looked out at the shore, the doctor having met up with them soon after they had left.

"Yeah but everyone and their cousin had the same idea." Chara grumbled from behind her.

What she said was true, the beach was crowded. There wasn't any free space left on the sandy shore of the lake. The Gravity Falls lake wasn't all that big to begin with, so when nearly the entire town tried to fit itself around it, the results were not pretty. Chara scowled and crossed her arms irritably, this was not her definition of fun.

She wore a black t-shirt and blue jeans. Her heart shaped necklace dangled in front of her shirt, glinting in the sunlight as she gazed out on the crowded area. Flowey looked over her shoulder as he balanced his pot on top of the backpack that adorned the former demon's shoulders.

"Chara, be nice." Frisk said. "It's a nice day out, let's just enjoy it."

She wore a light blue t-shirt and black shorts that went past her knees. She smiled as Toriel, Alphys, and Undyne nodded in agreement to her statement. Chara only nodded, still looking at the crowded area in annoyance.

With a little maneuvering, the Dreemurr family and friends made their way to a small not-so-packed spot to set up camp. Frisk and Toriel began laying down large beach towels while Undyne slammed the cooler she was carrying down and laughed manically, earning the group more than a few strange looks. With that everyone split up to do their own things.

Chara and Flowey moved to one of the towels and pulled out her drawing supplies from her backpack. Frisk also noticed a flash of familiar silver when Chara was zipping the pack closed though, might have to keep an eye on her. Alphys, and Undyne moved towards the water with the large Mer jumping in as soon as she got close enough. Alphys stayed on the sand and watched as Undyne laughed and splashed in the semi-shallow water.

Toriel and Frisk watched as their friends and family moved to their own spots on the crowded beach. They stayed back for a while, watching everyone enjoy themselves. In that time, the young human slowly began to see a trend. As she watched, she could not help but notice as the humans shied away from the monsters that were there.

Undyne, Alphys, and even Toriel were getting wary looks for being so close to Frisk. It had been a month already. Why couldn't people accept the monsters here? Noticing her adoptive daughter's sad expression, Toriel reached down and grabbed her daughter's hand.

"My child, what is wrong?"

"It's nothing," Frisk replied sadly. "It just seems like we've been for a month now and nothing has changed. The humans still fear us, still look down on us. Sometime I wonder if Chara was right." Toriel looked back at the beach and nodded in understanding.

"My child, you cannot expect the world to change overnight." She said consolingly. "Give them time, their views will change."

Frisk nodded morosely and slipped her hand out of Toriel's grasp. She walked through the beach, watching everything. It was a trait that had gotten her into more trouble than she cared to admit. After watching a few Humans shy away from a flexing Aaron, she turned around and began to walk back to the Dreemurr's spot. As she was walking, she spotted Chara and Flowey and began to smile happily. Her eyes glinted brightly as she walked towards her sister.

Chara had set herself up to where she could gaze at the beach by simply raising her head. She was currently laying on her stomach, drawing something. Flowey was sitting slightly in front of her, well within her field of view when she looked up. He was currently watching her draw what looked to be a rendition of Flowey smiling in front of the ocean, a thought so bizarre that Frisk had to double check the picture to see if she had gotten it right.

"Hey Chara," Frisk said once she got next to them them.

"Hey Frisk," Chara replied, not looking up, her face scrunching up as she worked on her drawing.

The demonic flower besides her, however, did look up before quickly turning back to the drawing and growling.

"Hey, get it right, you idiot!" He scolded Chara angrily. "My face doesn't look like that."

"Oh right, sorry," Char said sarcastically, looking up and giving him a deadpan stare. "I was remembering when you tried to kill me and Frisk as a giant television."

"I said I was sorry!" Flowey complained "Wh-"

"Guys," Frisk complained, trying to stop the fight before it went too far. "Stop, please."

They ignored her and kept bickering, Frisk saw something in the water and smiled happily knowing that she could stop the argument and greet a friend in one swoop. As much as she hated the metaphor "killing two birds with one stone" seemed apt in that scenario.

She rushed past Chara, swiping Flowey from his spot as she did so. The flower squawked in surprise and anger at the sudden movement. Ignoring her former enemy, Frisk ran up to the water, dodging left and right to avoid people as she ran to the shore, looking just past Undyne and Alphys. She set the plant down quickly before waving enthusiastically at the lake.

"Frisk!" Flowey snarled. "What the hell do you think you're doing?"

"Hi Onionsan!" she yelled out to the seemingly empty water, waving her hand energetically.

Several people glared at her before turning back to their activities, mostly preparing to go fishing, a few even grumbled about "the damn monster child." Frisk tried to ignore them all and watched as a thin yellow tentacle cautiously rose above the surface of the water. The yellow appendage waved a little before quickly sinking back under the water.

Frisk kept waving for a few seconds before turning towards Flowey. The plant's face bore a look of confusion that rivaled the one Chara made when Frisk explained her reason for meeting her for the first time.

"Frisk, why did you take Flowey and bolt like that?" Chara puffed as she ran up to the two, her drawings and pencil still in hand.

"I thought I saw Onionsan's head spike under the water so I wanted to say 'hello.'" The blue-clad girl shrugged uncomfortably, aware of the weirdness of her actions.

"Then why the hell did you feel the need to drag me along with you?" Flowey demanded waving his petals around angrily.

Frisk smiled and opened her mouth to answer that she grabbed Flowey to stop Chara and the former prince from arguing when she was cut off but a loud ringing of a megaphone. An old man in a faded suit and fez stepped up the the edge of the beach and raised the megaphone to his mouth.

"May I have your attention please?" he said into the amplification device after he had everyone's attention. "The world renowned Mystery Shack is holding a special event later this afternoon at two thirty." At this point the man sped up his speech. "Food and drink will be provided and may or may not cost a small fee."

He lowered the megaphone before smiling winningly and walking away. Frisk and Chara removed their fingers from their ears and watched the man walk towards a red convertible. Chara scowled at the man's back while Frisk looked excited. The Savior of the Underground thought that the "Mystery Shack" sounded fun, as well as slightly familiar. Besides how bad could one event be?

"Chara," Frisk exclaimed, "that sounds like fun." Chara fixed her sister with withering stare, Flowey's expression almost mirroring hers from his spot on the ground.

"Frisk, why?" the former prince asked. "It's just a tourist trap run by some idiot who makes money by tricking other, stupider idiots into spending large amounts of cash on things they don't need."

"But-"

"Hey, Punks" Undyne interrupted angrily from the towel that Chara had set up not twenty minutes before. "We're leaving."

Frisk and Chara looked around cautiously, searching for the source of their sudden choice of departure. They both zeroed in on Alphys almost immediately. The drakon was cowering behind Undyne, nervously wringing her hands and watching a group of humans warily. The group was rather menacing and they were all glaring at any monster that came too close to them. They were also coalescing around the spot that Undyne and Alphys had previously been occupying.

Undyne was watching the group as well, but, contrary to Alphys, she was baring her sharp teeth whenever any of the humans looked their direction. Her fists were clenched violently and the girls could see a slight crackle of blue electricity under the Mer's feet. Racist bigots had always pissed the guard captain off.

Chara tensed and scowled. She grabbed Frisk's wrist and scooped up Flowey and thrust him back into Frisk's other arm before walking stiffly towards the two monsters. Frisk felt a sharp prickle of magic at the base of her spine and looked over to see Chara's illusionary knife flickering in her other hand.

Flowey leaned backwards from Frisk's elbow and caught one of the humans glaring at them. He grinned evilly, his face morphing in an instant. His eyes lost all signs of kindness they may have had and turned into malicious pinpricks of light in pools of inky blackness. His near human-like frown was quickly replaced with a demonic, fanged, smile that promised torment and agony if the receiver didn't do exactly what the flower wanted. It was a look that that been aimed at many people over the years with only one person able to brush off its effects effortlessly.

They found Toriel after a few minutes of searching. She was having a pleasant conversation with a Migosp by the road, praising it on it's recent performance it had put on with Shyren and Madjick. They left and walked quickly back to the Dreemurr apartment, Undyne glaring at everyone they passed.

Despite her best efforts, Frisk couldn't get anyone to go to the Mystery Shack with her. But after talking with Papyrus, she learned that the man in charge really was a con artist and decided against going. The family had a nice afternoon with Undyne and Alphys, successfully forgetting the unpleasantness of the morning.

After lunch, Undyne and Alphys left, leaving the Dreemurrs alone in the apartment. Chara and Flowey went over the drawing that Chara had made at the beach, making small adjustments here and there to the image of Flowey sitting on the beach smirking at the viewer. Frisk went to her room and began practicing her magic. She didn't join Chara and Flowey because Toriel had forbidden her from practicing near Chara after a passing comment had resulted in her losing control and burning a hole in the carpet.

She made small sparks dance between her fingers as she controlled her breathing. Continuing to breath carefully, she increased the size of the sparks until she held a small flame in the center of her palm. Toriel said that Fire magic reacted to emotions, so that meant keeping her thoughts in order, hence the breathing. A shout from Chara caused the exact opposite of the desired mental state to occur.

"Frisk, can you grab my pencils?" Her sister shouted from the living room. Frisk jumped and started to juggle the small ball of fire in her surprise. She finally caught the flame with both hands and put it out.

"Sure," the final fallen human called out shakily.

She got off the bed and walked over to her sister's bed. She crouched down and reached under the frame, feeling for the small box that Chara used to store her drawing supplies. Her fingers skimmed across the top of the box and she reached further in, to pull it out. Then her fingers brushed across something else behind the pencil box. Curious, Frisk reached farther back and pulled out the foreign object. It was an old, dark blue binder with the word "Reminders" on the front cover. Frisk opened the cover and looked inside. The binder was full of black and white drawings on slightly yellowed paper. Every single picture was much more detailed than she had ever seen Chara draw and all of them seemed to be from the Underground.

Frisk flipped through the first few pictures, looking at the beautiful drawings. Every one of them featured Agsore, Toriel, Asriel, and/or Chara. They showed Chara picking flowers, Asriel laughing with Asgore, Toriel cooking in the kitchen. That last one could have been from above ground but Frisk doubted it. The pictures all looked like scenes from a happy life, but it was almost as if every scene was exuding a puff of sadness as well.

She kept flipping through the memories until she found a page that looked different from the others. Unlike the previous drawings, this one was done on new, white paper. It was a simple design. And, unlike the others, didn't contain anyone from the Dreemurr family.

Instead it was a picture of a heart, like how Frisk's soul looked when it was called out during battle. Beside the heart was a gleaming silver knife with the reflection of a glowing eye on the blade. Under the two objects, a couple of words were written in a bright red color, similar to the color of the heart. _My savior's soul shines_ _crimson_ _emerald._ There were a couple of splotches around the words but none interfered with the meaning of the words.

Frisk wiped her eyes to clear the tears that were starting to form and kept flipping through the binder. The next pictures were newer, now completely centered on life on the surface. There were only a couple of them, not like the pages and pages that took up the rest of the book.

There was one of Asgore standing in his suit as he looked out towards the sunrise. That had been the last time they had seen him before he went to become the monster ambassador. Frisk remembered that moment like it was yesterday. Apparently, so did Chara.

There was one of Frisk laughing with a Loox and a Froggit. The picture was so incredibly detailed, it was almost like Chara had taken a photo of the moment and placed it on the page.

The final picture in the binder was split in half. On one side, Flowey sat in his pot, looking forlornly out of the window, where Frisk could make out the image of Toriel laughing with a monster. On the other side of the picture, the white paper had been shaded a light grey. Frisk saw a drawing of herself sitting curled up on a bed in the darkness of the paper. Under the two images there a line and a single sentence.

Frisk put the secret fragment of Chara's life back under the bed, pulling out the box of pencils. She reached inside and drew out a few pencils. She then put the box back and stepped out of the room, the words of the final picture ringing in her head.

"Even the best person can change."


End file.
